973.7L63   Hertz,  Emanuel 
GH44asd 


Abraham  Lincoln  --  The  Seer 


LINCOLN  ROOM 

UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS 
LIBRARY 


MEMORIAL 

the  Class  of  1901 

founded  by 

HARLAN  HOYT  HORNER 

and 

HENRIETTA  CALHOUN  HORNER 


Abraham  Lincoln— The  Seer 


EMANUEL    HERTZ 


-^ 


AN  ADDRESS  DELIVERED  OVER 

W  O  R 

FEBRUARY  12th,  1924 


/  / 


ABRAHAM  LINCOLN  — THE  SEER 

By  EMANUEL  HERTZ 

O  those  who  at  this  day  still  collect  the  carpings  and  fault 
findings  of  the  Lincoln  presidential  campaigns,  and  of  the 
Lincoln  administration, — to  those  who  attempt  to  pull 
down  that  colossal  figure  to  their  own  mental  dimen- 
sions— to  those  who  discern  in  Lincoln  a  master  politician  who 
was  ever  on  the  alert  for  the  chance  to  hold  public  office — to  those 
who  are  convinced  that  Lincoln  muddled  through  the  Civil  War,  and 
succeeded  only  by  reason  of  the  remarkable  generation  of  men  who 
sprang  up  at  the  call  of  country — to  those  who  believe  that  Seward 
was  the  master  mind  who  guided  our  foreign  policies,  that  Chase  was 
the  financial  genius,  Stanton  the  mind  that  guided  our  armies,  and 
McClellan  the  drill  master  of  the  Rebellion — what  I  have  to  say  will 
be  of  little  interest.  But  to  those  who  have  swept  away  the  libels 
and  the  grotesque  attributes  which  have  bc'cn  attempted  to  be 
maliciously  ascribed  to  the  great  War  President,  my  message  may 
add  a  little  more  light  to  that  strange  figure — whose  providential 
appearance  at  that  time  and  in  that  place  has  but  one  parallel  in 
recorded  history.  To  those  who  see  in  Lincoln  more  than  the  uncouth 
frontiersman,  more  than  the  circuit  lawyer,  the  local  politician,  the 
fact  that  his  earthly  existence  falls  into  almost  the  identical  mould 
which  held  the  life  and  the  work  of  Moses,  the  old  lawgiver,  will 
become  more  and  more  apparent.  On  examining  the  sermons  and 
pamphlets  immediately  after  the  assassination  of  the  martyred 
President  and  the  innumerable  orations  and  speeches  on  succeeding 
anniversaries  of  that  never-to-be-forgotten  event,  I  find  that  very 
few  people  have  noted  the  comparison  between  the  ancient  lawgiver 
and  our  liberator,  other  than  the  final  act  on  Mount  Nebo,  which  was 
so  beautifully  set  forth  in  the  classic  sermon  preached  by  Henry  Ward 
Beecher.  All  seem  to  overlook  the  very  bringing  up  of  the  two 
youths;  the  fact  that  both  Moses  and  Lincoln  were  endowed  with 
extraordinary  physical  power,  as  is  seen  from  the  conflict  between 
Moses  and  the  Egyptian  slave  driver  on  the  one  hand,  and  Lincoln, 
who  on  all  occasions  participated  in  and  superintended  all  physical 
conflicts,  and  became  known  as  the  most  physically  powerful  young 
man  in  Sangamon  County.  They  have  equally  overlooked  the  appear- 
ance of  the  two  men, — Moses,  as  the  Midrash  tells  us,  was  not 
endowed  with  any  physical  attractiveness;  his  appearance,  his  man- 
ner, his  stature,  his  being  "heavy  of  speech,"  are  all  well  known : 

3 


and,  if  we  similarly  examine  Lincoln's  ungainly  features  and  ungainly 
body,  we  find  similar  characteristics.  But  who  ever  thinks  of  the 
appearance  of  Moses  when  we  see  what  has  been  transmitted  to  us 
by  painter,  sculptor  and  poet,  any  more  than  we  think  of  Lincoln's 
appearance  when  we  see  that  miracle  in  bronze  wrought  by  the  genius 
of  Augustus  St.  Gaudens. 

The  men  of  Lincoln's  time  who  required  the  bullet  of  the  assassin 
to  open  their  beclouded  eyes,  saw  in  his  untimely  taking  off — the 
resemblance  only  to  that  other  taking  off — of  Moses  on  Pisgah.  But 
in  spite  of  the  burning  desire  of  the  lawgiver  to  cross  the  Jordan  and 
lead  his  people  into  the  Promised  Land — his  work  was  done — his 
task  was  completed — a  life  work  and  a  giant  task  which  sapped  his 
strength,  which  tired  the  noble  frame  in  spite  of  the  fact  that  "his 
eye  was  not  dim,  nor  his  natural  force  abated."  Moses  was  at  his 
best  on  Sinai  and  at  the  Red  Sea.  At  no  time  thereafter  is  he  seen 
in  more  heroic  proportions.  Moses  the  seer,  Moses  of  the  great  joint 
debate  with  the  mighty  Pharaoh — the  debate  in  ten  sessions — Moses 
at  Sinai — the  terrible  Moses  who — when  he  saw  his  people  dance 
about  the  golden  calf — broke  the  tablets — and  the  Moses  who  spoke 
"eye  to  eye"  with  the  Lord  of  Hosts,  for  an  entire  people — in  their 
presence,  in  their  hearing,  was  by  all  odds  a  greater  Moses  than  the 
Moses  at  the  completion  of  his  task.  Moses  the  General  leading  his 
people  following  the  pillar  of  fire  by  night  and  the  cloud  by  day  to 
the  Red  Sea,  was  infinitely  more  resourceful,  more  heroic,  more 
capable  than  the  Moses  of  forty  years  later — after  the  travail,  the 
wandering,  the  rebellions,  the  tasks  of  forty  years — during  which  he 
wrought  the  miracle  of  transforming  a  nation  of  slaves  into  a  nation 
of  priests — a  nation  of  priests  who  have  ministered  to  mankind  from 
that  day  to  this.  And  so  in  His  infinite  wisdom.  His  Maker  called 
him,  the  most  modest  of  all  men,  his  most  trusted  servant,  the  only 
man  with  whom  he  spoke  face  to  face — to  his  eternal  reward.  And 
strange  as  it  may  seem,  this  marvelous  parallel  between  Moses  and 
Lincoln  has  been  overlooked  by  preacher,  by  biographer,  by  contem- 
porary and  present  day  Lincoln  speaker  and  orator.  From  the  very 
first  moment  when  Abraham  Lincoln  appears,  he  hears  the  voice  of 
God,  like  the  youth  in  the  temple — Eli  heard  it  not — like  that  young 
prophet,  Lincoln  in  the  slave  market  at  New  Orleans  hears  the  call 
to  destroy  slavery. 

Is  there  any  doubt  that  Lincoln  heard  the  divine  summons  then 
and  there?  Moses  heard  it  and  saw  it  in  the  form  of  the  slave  task 
master — whom  he  slew  and  whose  body  he  hid  in  the  sand.  Moses 
heard  the  call  from  the  burning  bush — Lincoln  in  the  slave  market 
in  New  Orleans.  Henceforth,  his  whole  life  was  devoted  to  the  task 
of  abolishing  slavery — as  was  that  of  the  other  man  of  God — to 
destroy  the  power  and  the  results  of  the  Egyptian  task  master.   Then, 

4 


in  the  solemn  solitudes  of  the  prairies,  in  the  great  primeval  forest, 
in  the  virgin  fields,  he  received  his  mission  and  his  preparation,  as 
did  his  great  prototype  receive  his  in  the  desert  of  Midian.  Both 
given  to  contemplation — to  introspection,  each  was  prepared  and 
educated  during  years  of  study,  of  exacting  tasks,  of  enlightening 
experiences  for  the  life  task  before  him,  one  was  steeped  in  the  mar- 
velous culture  of  Egypt,  the  other  read  every  book  that  he  could 
find  within  fifty  miles.  Lincoln  too  was  at  the  height  of  his  physical 
and  intellectual  vigor,  not  on  that  fatal  Good  Friday — when  he  passed 
from  belonging  to  the  American  people  to  that  of  the  ages — not  after 
the  storm  and  stress  of  six  years  of  the  hardest,  most  wearing  and 
exhausting  political  and  military  campaign  this  country  or  the  world 
had  up  to  his  day  ever  seen — not  then  was  he  at  his  best.  His 
pathetic  longing  to  return  to  Springfield  for  rest,  for  a  quiet  life, 
this  certainly  did  not  betoken  the  militant  debater,  the  victorious 
candidate  and  indomitable  war  president  of  1861-1865.  He,  like 
Moses  at  the  Red  Sea,  was  at  his  best  in  the  midst  of  divided  coun- 
cils, in  the  midst  of  the  babel  of  voices,  forcing  advice  upon  him  of 
how  to  save  the  Union,  how  to  win  the  war,  how  to  terminate  the 
bloodshed — there  he  stood  alone  in  the  midst  of  that  mob — ready  to 
destroy  him,  ready  to  remove  him,  ready  to  tear  from  his  hands  the 
task  for  which  he  was  divinely  anointed.  Here  is  the  heroic  figure 
duplicating  that  other  figure  at  the  Red  Sea.  He  was  at  his  best 
when  he  came  into  the  Northern  camp — and  amid  the  noise  and  con- 
fusion paused  to  utter  a  single  sentence  that  he  might  be  heard  above 
the  din.  He  bore  a  commission  from  God  on  high !  He  said :  "A 
house  divided  against  itself  cannot  stand.  I  believe  this  Government 
cannot  endure  permanently  half  free  and  half  slave.  I  do  not  expect 
the  Union  to  be  dissolved :  I  do  not  expect  the  house  to  fall :  but 
I  do  expect  it  will  cease  to  be  divided."  He  was  at  his  best  when  he 
replied  to  Greeley:  "My  paramount  object  is  to  save  the  Union  and 
not  either  to  save  or  destroy  Slavery."  He  was  at  his  best  when  he 
penned  the  Emancipation,  the  Gettysburg  address,  and  the  First  and 
Second  Inaugural.  He  was  at  his  best  when  he  brought  to  a  vic- 
torious conclusion  the  war  and  saved  the  Union,  crushed  rebellion 
and  freed  the  slave.  As  Lincoln  said  there  were  four  parties  in  the 
North ;  Moses  had  his  four  parties.  Those  who  were  ready  to  return 
to  Egypt — those  who  were  ready  to  throw  themselves  into  the  Red 
Sea — those  ready  to  compromise  with  Egypt — and  those  who  stood 
ready  to  fight  for  the  Lord,  for  his  prinicples  and  for  his  newly  freed 
people. 

Lincoln  had  his  four  parties :  Those  who  were  ready  to  sacrifice 
the  Union  so  long  as  they  could  accomplish  the  abolition  of  slavery. 
Among  them  were  also  business  men  who  were  ready  to  sacrifice  the 
Union  in  order  to  save  their  business, — in  order,  as  they  said,  that 

5 


"the  grass  might  not  grow  in  the  streets  of  our  commercial  centers." 
Still  others  there  were  who  were  pacifists,  who  wanted  to  avoid  blood- 
shed regardless  of  results,  and  were  ready  to  go  back  to  the  pre-War 
status  and  have  each  State  determine  for  itself  the  question  of  slavery. 

Then  there  was  the  traitor,  the  Southern  propagandist  in  the 
North,  cooperating  with  his  fellows  in  the  South,  the  emissaries  of 
the  South  and  of  secession  were  everywhere.  But  thank  God,  the 
greatest  and  most  important  of  these  four  parties  were  those  who 
said,  "Let  us  go  out  and  fight  them'* — who  cheerfully  sang  and 
responded:  "We  are  coming,  Father  Abraham" — that  party 
responded  with  funds,  with  help,  with  loyalty,  and  overwhelmed  and 
finally  convinced  the  Greeleys,  the  McClellans  and  even  Beecher, 
Wendel  Phillips  and  Carl  Schurz  that  he — Lincoln — was  the  master 
of  the  situation  and  his  method  was  the  only  method  which  would 
keep  the  border  States  in  the  Union — which  meant  the  ultimate 
extinction  of  slavery  and  of  the  Rebellion. 

As  we  proceed  the  parallel  grows  until  the  two  figures  of  the 
ages  almost  look  alike.  It  was  to  the  most  modest  man  in  the  land 
in  each  case — millennia  apart — that  the  Almighty  committed  the  great 
tasks.  Some  of  his  erstwhile  enemies  began  to  perceive  that  light  in 
the  features  of  the  Great  Emancipator,  as  they  dwelt  with  him 
through  those  times  which  tried  men's  souls. 

The  traces  of  communion  with  his  Maker  are  almost  as  numerous 
in  the  life  of  Lincoln  as  in  the  life  of  Moses — from  the  moment  when 
he  heard  the  Methodist  preacher  on  the  questions  of  the  hour — and 
came  away  convinced  that  he  was  to  bear  a  great  part  in  the  irre- 
pressible conflict  until  the  day  before  his  taking  off  when  he  dreamt 
that  the  President  was  in  the  catafalque  in  the  East  Room — his  life 
is  full  of  visions — of  dreams,  of  direct  appears  to  the  God  of  Moses. 
From  the  day  he  left  Springfield,  with  forebodings  that  he  would 
never  return,  to  the  day  after  Gettysburg,  when  General  Sickles  tells 
us  that  after  he  was  wounded  at  Gettysburg,  Lincoln  visited  him  in 
the  hospital,  he  asked  Lincoln  what  he  thought  of  the  victory  at 
Gettysburg,  and  what  he  had  been  doing  or  preparing  to  do  during 
that  awful  battle,  and  Lincoln  replied,  "Well,  Sickles,  if  you  want 
to  know  what  I  was  doing  about  that  time,  I  will  tell  you.  There  is 
one  room  in  the  White  House  where  there  is  little  furniture,  and  I 
went  in  there  and  shut  the  door,  and  got  down  on  my  knees  and  said 
to  the  Lord :  'You  know.  Lord,  I  have  done  all  I  can.  This  is  your 
struggle.  Lord ;  Pve  done  all  I  can !'  And  then  I  cried  out  with  all 
my  heart :  'Oh,  God,  give  us  the  victory.'  When  suddenly  it  occurred 
to  me  to  say:  'Oh,  that  I  might  have  some  token  by  which  I  could 
be  assured  of  a  victory!'  Then  such  a  sweet  spirit  came  over  me, 
such  an  undescribable  spirit,  that  I  was  assured  of  a  victory  before  I 

6 


ever  heard  the  news !"  To  the  very  last  day  when  he  told  Grant, 
in  the  presence  of  the  whole  Cabinet,  that  he  was  sure  that  Sherman 
had  been  victorious  because  "I  had  my  usual  dream — such  as  I  had 
before  Antietam,  Gettysburg  and  Vicksburg."  In  one  form  or  another 
he  communed  with  God. 

And  to  whom  did  he  tell  these — and  in  whose  presence  did  he 
repeat  all  these — to  his  wife,  to  his  intimates,  to  those  who  were 
anxious  to  agree  with  him  ?  No !  To  his  enemies — to  his  detractors, 
to  men  of  steel  and  iron,  like  Grant — to  Chase,  id  Stanton,  to  his 
Cabinet,  to  his  neighbors  in  Springfield,  to  the  entire  Nation  in  his 
Second  Inaugural. 

From  the  highest  reach  that  Lincoln  had  attained  before  his 
accession  to  the  Presidency,  to  the  zenith  of  his  career,  the  space 
seems  incalculable.  The  study  of  his  earlier  life  shows,  indeed,  that 
he  possessed  clearness  of  thought,  remarkable  gift  of  expression, 
native  sagacity,  honesty  of  purpose,  and  courage  of  conviction ;  that 
he  loved  his  country;  but  that  he  possessed  elements  of  greatness  in 
such  degree  as  the  War  revealed  could  hardly  have  been  surmised. 
And  that  he  should  manifest  so  soon  and  so  signally  his  ability  to 
rule  a  great  nation  in  the  most  dangerous  period  of  its  existence; 
that  he  should  overtower  his  associates  and  prove  that,  more  than 
they,  he  was  fitted  to  save  the  Government;  that  he  could  wield  a 
power  that  was  greater  than  that  of  any  of  his  predecessors  and 
surpassing  that  exercised  by  any  contemporary  ruler,  king  or  emperor, 
could  not  have  been  foreseen  by  any  lacking  divine  inspiration.  Not 
by  graded  steps,  but  by  giant  stride,  Lincoln  reached  the  height  of 
power,  achievement  and  fame. 

True,  the  progress  of  the  War  revealed  growth  in  character,  in 
thought  and  in  force,  and  he  stood  much  higher  at  its  close  than  at 
its  beginning;  but  at  its  opening  it  early  became  apparent  that 
Providence  had  so  shaped  the  country's  destiny  that  the  man  who 
had  been  chosen  mainly  because  of  his  availability  as  a  candidate  was 
far  and  away  the  one  man  for  the  office  and  for  the  work. 

There  is  nothing  more  for  the  great  leader  to  do.  His  work  is 
ended  He  had  trudged  across  the  prairie ;  climbed  the  foothills ;  has 
struggled  up  the  mountain  side ;  he  is  almost  at  the  end  of  the  journey 
and  is  very  tired.  His  tragic  visage  was  that  of  one  who  had  borne 
the  grief  of  a  people  and  carried  their  sorrow.  He  has  removed  from 
our  free  institutions  the  curse  of  slavery  and  established  at  last  an 
indestructible  Union;  in  a  few  days  he  will  reach  the  top  of  the 
mountain  of  fame ;  tarry  there  for  a  brief  moment  and  be  silhouetted 
forever  against  the  skyline  of  history.  Then  of  him  it  shall  be  said, 
as  of  one  of  old — "He  was  not,  for  God  took  him" — and  to  us  is  left 
the  heritage  of  the  wonderful  afterglow  of  Abraham  Lincoln's  life. 

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